Monthly Archives: May 2017

Chilenito cocktails at Auberge Chileno Bay

Mexico has many problems, but the lack of a national cocktail is not one of them. Everyone, in the U.S., at least, associates one cocktail, and one cocktail alone, with Mexico: the Margarita. (Only a pedant would argue for the Paloma.)

I imagined that I would be offered a non-stop parade of Margaritas in Mexico. Some might be made with mezcal, tequila’s smoky/spicy sibling, and some might incorporate mango juice or some such. But I expected that basically the cocktail lists at most restaurants and hotels wouldn’t differ much from that at the average Cesar’s.

To be honest, this prospect did not inspire within me feelings of unmixed disappointment. I love a good Margarita. I make them myself with some regularity. A good Margarita, to be clear, uses fresh lime juice (not chemical-green sour mix), silver tequila (or reposado, if you prefer a mellower flavor), orange liqueur like Cointreau or Triple Sec, and a dash of simple syrup or agave nectar. I serve it up, in a martini glass or coupe, and garnish it with nothing, not even salt. I’m a simple kind of guy, and simply kind of lazy.

It was quite a surprise, then, when my welcome cocktail at my first resort in Los Cabos incorporated mezcal, poblano pepper liqueur, fresh pineapple, fresh ginger and B&B bitters. It was called a Chilenito, and it was a delight: sweet, smokey, a little vegetal and a little spicy.

Cocktails with sophistication and complexity, I was soon to discover, are more the rule than the exception in Cabo’s finer bars and dining establishments. Baja has as much craft cocktail cred as Brooklyn these days. Consider the evidence, in both Margarita and non-Margarita form:

A Spritz Bay by the pool at Auberge Chileno Bay, a mix of Prosecco with strawberry, lime and ginger. A very refreshing sort of Mexican/Italian sangria, if you will. I certainly did!

*****

A Humo de Comal, at Comal, the main restaurant of Auberge Chileno Bay. It combines mezcal, purple chicha (fermented corn) and lime to great effect. The rim of tortilla ash is something you smell more than taste, its smoky note heralding the smokiness of the mezcal, which mixed beautifully with the hibiscus-like sweetness of the chicha.

*****

Flora Farm may call this a Margarita, but it’s unlike any I’ve ever had. This Ginger & Beet Margarita, as you might guess, mixed tequila, fresh beet juice and fresh ginger. It had excellent balance and an invigorating freshness. Beet and ginger, it seems, add quite the frisson of health to two ounces of tequila!

*****

Tamarind strikes me as a grossly underutilized cocktail ingredient. This Mezcalita at Esperanza‘s La Palapa restaurant mixed it with mezcal and lime, and wow. It moved from sweet to smoky to sour to paprika spice, in that order. Complex and delicious.

*****

Speaking of tamarind, this Tamarind Margarita at Los Tres Gallos in Cabo San Lucas ranks among the greatest Margaritas I’ve ever tasted. The sour notes positively popped in the mouth, tempered with precision by the sweetness of the tequila, orange liqueur and agave syrup. Magnificent.

*****

A Prickly Pear Margarita by the pool at Esperanza, with silver tequila, mango, grilled prickly pear (nopal) and lime. It might have been perfectly fine, this cocktail, with just the sweetness from the fresh mango and tartness from the fresh lime. But the grilled prickly pear gave the drink subtle earthy and vegetal notes, taking it to another level entirely.

*****

Rancho Pescadero on the coast just south of Todos Santos has an immense garden, and the bartender took full advantage of its bounty in this cocktail. I watched, amazed, as he grabbed great handfuls of mint, fennel fronds, basil, chervil and cilantro and muddled them together, mixing the resulting juice with lime, simple syrup and Hendrick’s Gin, topping it all off with tonic. This Herb Tonic cocktail tasted quite refreshing, of course, with bright herbaceous and citrus notes leavening the booziness (it looks like healthy green juice, but this was a seriously strong cocktail).

As wonderful as it was to consume these drinks in beautiful Mexico, you don’t have to brave the incipient border wall to enjoy creative cocktails made with tequila and mezcal. There’s no reason you can make a delicious drink yourself at home.

A formula with which to experiment: 2 parts tequila or mezcal, 1 part liqueur, 1-2 parts fresh juice (sugar syrup and/or fresh herbs optional). For example, right now, I’m loving a concoction of mezcal, fresh lemon juice and Stirrings Ginger liqueur. Sweet, citrusy, a little smoky, and a little spicy from the ginger.

I would love to hear what you come up with — if you discover a delicious and unusual tequila- or mezcal-based cocktail, please don’t hesitate to share the recipe!

If you think of Cahors at all, you likely think of big, tannic reds. Stretched along the Lot River in southwestern France, this region is the original Malbec country. Argentina can claim responsibility for Malbec’s renaissance — even Cahors winemakers admit this fact — but the grape variety was born in France. All AOC Cahors wines must be at least 70% Malbec, with the remainder a blend of Merlot and/or Tannat. Cahors white wines do not exist.

Which is not to say that white wine is not made in Cahors. Indeed, Cahors winemakers produce gorgeous white wines, made mostly from Chardonnay, Viognier and/or Chenin Blanc. But they are not Cahors. After tasting delicious white after delicious white, it struck me that the powers that be in the Cahors AOC have made quite the oversight.

And they’re not the only ones. I can find no reference to the white wines of the region in any of my usual resources, The Oxford Companion to Wine, The World Atlas of Wine or The Sotheby’s Wine Encyclopedia. My pre-trip research gave me no reason to expect that I would encounter a single white in Cahors during my stay.

So you will, I trust, forgive my surprise when the sommelier in the restaurant of the Château de la Treyne hotel first confronted me with a Viognier/Chardonnay blend by Clos Triguedina, one of the most important wineries in Cahors. When I tasted it, I was positively shocked: ripe and rich, with stone fruit and pineapple notes, sharpening into orangey, gingery spice and a dry finish. Well balanced and classy.

Countryside south of the Lot River

I tasted this wine again at Clos Triguedina itself, hidden in the countryside just south of Puy L’Évêque, a medieval town rising steeply from the Lot. Olga and I had a tasting in the cozy old tasting room, lit by stained-glass windows (a new minimalist tasting room is under construction). We tasted the soon-to-be-bottled 2016 rosé of Malbec together. “This is like a bon-bon,” she exclaimed. And indeed, it had plenty of watermelon and strawberry fruit, but it tasted dry and spicy nevertheless. As with the Chardonnay/Vioginier blend, this rosé cannot be labeled as Cahors.

Owner and winemaker Jean-Luc Baldès worked for a time in Barsac, which, like neighboring Sauternes, produces sweet botryrized white wines. And, somehow, he has found a way to produce a botrytized wine in Cahors as well: a Chenin Blanc. The 2014 tasted lush and sweet, with ample dark honey, stone-fruit flavors like apricot, and orangey acids that slowly grow, ensuring that the wine remains balanced.

Sabine Baldès

His wife, Sabine, led me to the vineyards behind the tasting room and estate house, where her mother-in-law lives. The vines occupy a gentle but distinct rise in the land, affording panoramic views in almost every direction. This pebbly hump counts among Cahors’ finest vineyard locations, and in the coming classification, I would be surprised if it weren’t awarded Grand Cru status.

But the slope of the Pigeonnier vineyard spilling down from the 15th-century Château Lagrézette gives Clos Triguedina some serious competition. Led by Sales Administrator Yannick Druon, I toured the winery, built right into the hillside. He explained that when workers dug out the space for the winery in 1992, they preserved each layer of soil individually, so that the terroir might be restored to its former condition once construction was complete.

I won’t soon forget the 2015 “White Vision” Le Pigeonnier Viognier. It was wonderfully fragrant, with aromas of jasmine and white peach. It tasted full and fat, but not blowsy — oodles of focused spice and orangey acids gave the big, bold wine some firm boundaries. Nor was the less-expensive 2010 “Dame de Grézette” Chardonnay any slouch. It smelled fresh and fruity, not oaky, and though its fruit was deliciously creamy, this wine had no buttery or woodsy notes. Zesty spice built and built, and the wine ended dry. Very refined.

In fact, I didn’t have to travel any farther than my hotel to find a winery producing a notable Cahors white. Under the front garden of the Château de Mercuès is a well-designed contemporary winery which seems to play second fiddle to the owner’s more famous winery, Château de Haute-Serre. Nevertheless, the 2014 Château de Mercuès Chenin Blanc was a delight. It had a clear, pure, fruity aroma, and it tasted of ripe pear and lemon peel. Refined spice tightened into quite a long finish. I also had the chance to try the 2014 Château de Haute-Serre “Albesco” Chardonnay, which blew me away.  I loved its dewy aroma with notes of buttered popcorn, and its rich, buttery flavor that maintained balance with focused orangey acids and gentle spice. It might have been Burgundian.

Château Lagrézette

So far, I have found just one book that talks about the whites of Cahors more than in passing. But even in Michael S. Sanders’ Families of the Vine: Seasons Among the Winemakers of Southwest France, the whites aren’t taken very seriously:

“…Many winemakers then complete their lines with the fruit of their playtime — rosés and whites made in small quantities because, quite simply, it amuses them to turn their hand to something different.”

The whites I tasted were more than playtime. They were often quite refined and elegant, and they were always delicious. Perhaps its time for Cahors wine laws to recognize what is already happening in the AOC. It’s silly that such well-crafted wines must be labeled as Vin de Pays.